An Afghan man works on a poppy field in Jalalabad province (Reuters / Parwiz) / Reuters

Despite Washington spending $7.6 billion on counter-narcotic initiatives in Afghanistan, 2013 witnessed a record surge in the amount of opium poppy cultivation, according to the US inspector general for Afghan reconstruction.

The Central Asian country cultivated a record 209,000 hectares
(516,000 acres) of opium poppy in 2013, beating the previous
highest level of 193,000 hectares (477,000 acres) in 2007,
according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).

Battle-hardened Afghanistan produces more than 80 percent of the
world's opium.

"In past years, surges in opium poppy cultivation have been
met by a coordinated response from the US government and
coalition partners, which has led to a temporary decline in
levels of opium production," John Sopko, Special Inspector
General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, wrote in a letter to
Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel,
Reuters reported.

"The recent record-high level of poppy cultivation calls into
question the long-term effectiveness and sustainability of those
prior efforts," he said.

The UNODC estimated the total value of Afghan poppy cultivation,
together with opium products, in 2013 at about $3 billion, a 50
percent increase over the $2 billion level set in 2012.

Sopko attributes this increase to “deteriorating security in
many parts of Afghanistan and low levels of eradication of poppy
fields.” He went on to predict “further increases in
cultivation” in 2014.

The US official pointed to more-effective irrigation techniques
based on deep-well technology imported to Afghanistan that have
given Afghan farmers the ability to turn “200,000 hectares
(494,000 acres) of desert in southwestern Afghanistan into arable
land,” Reuters reported.

The US Embassy in Kabul called the latest information on opium
poppy production in Afghanistan "disappointing news," it
said in a statement.

"Essentially, poppy cultivation has shifted from areas where
government presence is broadly supported and security has
improved, toward more remote and isolated areas where governance
is weak and security is inadequate," it said, as quoted by
Reuters.

The “unprecedented” surge in opium poppy cultivation
comes as an embarrassment for US reconstruction efforts in
Afghanistan, where before the US invasion in 2001 the Taliban had
effectively eliminated the trade. Today, in an ironic twist, the
illegal trade is providing a financial boost to the Taliban’s
resurgence.

Aside from providing extra funds to extremist groups and
terrorist organizations, Afghan poppy, the raw material of opium
and heroin, is increasingly making its way to the streets of
Europe.

Russia, which has an estimated 1.5 million heroin addicts, has in
the past demanded that the United States and its NATO allies
commit themselves to an aerial defoliation program to destroy the
poppy fields.

Western leaders rejected such a course of action.

NATO spokesman James Appathurai said in 2010 that the US-led
alliance, which is set to turn over security to Afghan forces at
the end of this year, did not wish to remove “the only source
of income of people who live in the second poorest country in the
world without being able to provide them with an
alternative."

Victor Ivanov, director of the Federal Narcotics Service of
Russia, responded to NATO’s position by asking: "Is that not
a threat to world peace and security?"